The Cellars of Notre Dame

by Barbara Frale

  The truth was that she missed him so much that it took her breath away, but she could do nothing to unblock the conflict which prevailed between them other than withdraw from her own position and from the wise decisions she had made in the interest of her people. In a moment of weakness, she buried her face in her hands in search of courage. She had specific duties to perform, and many unpleasant but necessary things required her attention.

  She dipped her pen in the inkwell, then wrote a second letter.

  To Monsignor Periz de Legaria, archbishop of Pamplona and Tudela, private secretary of the Crown of Navarre.

  Reverend Monsignor,

  Beloved spiritual father, as I write to you, my husband is perhaps signing in his room an indictment against the sacred person of Boniface VIII, the supreme pontiff, about which I can do nothing but fear the worst. As far as I am concerned, I know that the duty of a queen is to ignore herself, to renounce her affections and to face gladly any sacrifice to ensure the good of her country; thus I have said publicly that Navarre will sign no documents and will support no action capable of harming the honour and freedom of the Holy See.

  After my declaration, which everyone heard and for which I suffer every day the contempt of the court, it is at least certain that any form of religious censure which Boniface wishes to impose upon the kingdom of France will not be extended to Navarre, and thus will not fall on my people. I will pay a very high price for this decision but I owed it to my country; I am ready to endure the vendetta of my husband, who has not forgiven me for what I have done, as though I had committed the most infamous of betrayals against him.

  It is for this reason that I am writing to you to ask that the palace of Pamplona be opened up and prepared. I may be repudiated or perhaps exiled from France, and in that case, I will return to my country. With my heart shattered, my honour bespattered with mud and my life devastated, but I will in any case come home.

  As she was finishing the letter and adding her signature, the queen hesitated a moment. She wondered if it was a good idea to express her fears in that way, humiliating herself before a subordinate; but the terrible hypothesis she had described was not so remote, and the idea of having a homeland waiting for her, a safe haven to which to repair, comforted her shattered heart.

  A sudden knocking at the door tore her from her sad thoughts.

  “My lady, there is a person who wishes to speak to you,” announced Baroness Marie Galard, the queen’s first lady in waiting.

  “Not now, please. I am very busy.”

  “Forgive me, Madame. Cardinal Matthew of Acquasparta asked me to insist. It seems that the matter is urgent.”

  The famous theologian from the Sorbonne? Whatever could he want from her? Perhaps he had heard about her quarrel with the king because of the arrest perpetrated against a bishop and had now come to see her and compliment her, assuring her full support on behalf of the Holy See. But the thought was instantly erased from the queen’s mind as soon as the maid led the prelate into the study. The cardinal seemed tense, a bundle of nerves; excessively so, for a matter which, at the end of the day, did not concern him personally.

  Joan stood up and bowed in reverence to kiss his pastoral ring.

  “My lady, I will come to the point immediately,” he told her, without making the slightest concession to pleasantries. “Guillaume Nogaret insisted on taking me to one of the towers of Notre-Dame and he showed me an inscription.”

  “I think I have seen it too,” she replied, a puzzled expression on her face. “Though in reality they are simply two letters which mean nothing.”

  “It may be that they do mean something,” the cardinal objected. “It may be that the salvation of all the French people depend upon them. You must help me, Madame, or you will see the people of France falling decimated before your eyes by an awful calamity. Those two letters engraved at the base of the tower of Notre-Dame are not the only thing Nogaret showed me, so now I need you, because an extremely difficult mission awaits me. All roads lead to Rome. That is where Arnaldo da Villanova is. And there, I feel sure, there are also the answers we seek!”

  2

  THE FOURTH HORSEMAN

  At that time, men were tormented by a terrible disease: a hidden fire consumed and detached the limbs it had struck. Many were completely devoured by this fire in a single night.

  Rodulfus Glaber, ii, 13-17

  I

  A cold gale had been blowing through the streets of Rome since the dawn of that dark November morning. An angry and insistent north wind that hurled dead leaves in the face of passers-by and grabbed at the skirts of the priests.

  In the Niccoline chapel, the heart of the Sacred Palaces of the Vatican, Pope Boniface VIII let his nostrils delight in the celestial effluvium of incense. Meanwhile, the head of the Apostolic Chancellery, Cardinal Pietro Valeriano Duraguerra, officiated at the liturgy of an unusual offertory.

  “Twenty pieces of Byzantine brocade, Your Holiness. Four of that Venetian velvet they call because its weave contains curls of gold thread that shine like fireflies in the mid-August sky. A cup made from a huge sapphire. Six birds from Cyprus…”

  “Bellini!” interrupted the Pope. “What kind?”

  “These are not real birds, Your Holiness. They are small silver incense burners.”

  The pontiff was not overly pleased to hear this explanation. The Apostolic Treasury already overflowed with gold, silver and rare gems, and these umpteenth precious knick-knacks would simply be added to the great anonymous mass of glittering things accumulated in the hall of Castel Sant’Angelo which served as a treasure chest; Pope Boniface actually would have preferred to receive as a gift something which seemed to him an authentic rarity – two graceful little creatures from the forests of the East, with which to enrich his menagerie of exotic animals.

  Meanwhile, off to one side, Cardinal Matthew of Acquasparta was racking his brains about how to manage the thorny assignment that had brought him to Rome.

  A quick tour of the Sacred Palaces had sufficed to see that there was no trace of the Catalan. Those he had asked – without going into detail so as not to arouse suspicion – where His Holiness’s doctor was had given him a disheartening answer: His Holiness’s doctor? Guglielmo from Brescia? The disappointed cardinal had then turned to the accountant who kept the records of the Apostolic Chamber and, on the pretext of a personal malaise, had asked him if he could suggest the name of the person who took care of the pontiff: the very best one, the one who was paid better than all the others. His investigation revealed that the most highly paid doctor in the whole Curia was Taddeo Alderotti, whom the Italians considered a second Hippocrates, the accountant specified: he treated all the members of the Sacred College and was the perfect person to whom to entrust his health.

  Frustrated and confused, Matthew of Acquasparta had realized that the Catalan was inside the Vatican walls in an unofficial capacity; his presence was registered nowhere. Perhaps he was not even required there for his noted medicinal abilities, but for some other reason. This seemed to reinforce the framework of suspicions formulated by Nogaret: it could be that Boniface VIII was keeping the old man close to him because he considered him a valuable commodity for barter. A trusty treasure chest containing something that might moderate, if not completely halt, the offensive manner King Philip IV had adopted towards the Holy See.

  It was therefore clear to him that he could not succeed in the mission by continuing to poke about in the less reputable corners of the Curia. He had to put aside his fruitless and scattered researches, come out into the open and turn to the upper strata of the Holy Roman Church, where there was someone who surely knew; and perhaps would decide to help him.

  That man of good will, the only one who might agree to collaborate without asking for something large in return, was the head of the Apostolic Chancellery: Pietro Valeriano Duraguerra, a skilled veteran of papal diplomacy.

  He was a thin old man, as pallid as flour and with a tangle of frizzy white hair
on his head. To see him one would have thought him nothing more than some superfluous creature, as frail and graceful as those insects that skate upon the waters of the lakes, but the weight that he possessed in the gigantic gears of the Roman Curia was inversely proportional to that of his body. He was a man of great power, in short, even though he looked more like a penitent than a politician. And that was not his only singularity: although he was imbued with that functional cynicism without which a State cannot be run, he also possessed a conscience. A rare quality that made him an oddity in the circles of the high clergy and had earned him the unconditional trust of Boniface VIII.

  So Matthew of Acquasparta warily approached him until he was close enough to be able to make a sign with his hand that Duraguerra immediately noticed. Between one audience and the next, he found a way to come over to him in a corner of the room.

  “Welcome, Matthew,” said a surprised Cardinal Duraguerra. “We didn’t know of your arrival. Are you here for some unexpected reason? But come with me; the Pope will hear you immediately. It is not decent to keep a member of the Sacred College waiting, especially a revered theologian like you.”

  “Duraguerra, I’m not here to talk to His Holiness.”

  “I see. You have just arrived from Paris, you must be tired from the long journey. I will announce your arrival to the pontiff; he will see you tomorrow, when you have rested.”

  Bentivegna grabbed his arm with pleading eyes.

  “I came to Rome on a… let’s say a mission. I am in a very delicate situation and I hope very much for your understanding, my friend: in fact, though I have no assignment from the king of France, I must yet fulfil a mission of vital importance for the good of the Church!”

  Duraguerra’s bushy eyebrows contracted in a frown.

  “You weren’t sent by Philip IV? But then…”

  “It is complicated to explain, so I trust in God and in the men of good will. Men like you, Duraguerra. I know you work day and night to keep the peace, so I ask you to help me. There are things I need to communicate to His Holiness, but I cannot risk a diplomatic incident! They concern Arnaldo da Villanova: the king of France wants him back to Paris. He absolutely must have him back, and it was in order to have an adequate bargaining chip that he had the bishop of Pamiers arrested. Do you understand the enormity of the situation?”

  Yes, Duraguerra understood perfectly. A bitter and apparently bloodless diplomatic war was going on between the Pope and the King of France. Charismatic and remarkable men both, they were the two pillars of the world, one and the other ; yet they competed with each other over who was better at employing subterfuges, lies and low blows. It was impossible to serve the noble cause of peace in this way.

  The head of the Apostolic Chancellery simply did not know what to do. He scratched his matted hair with both hands in perplexity. It was a superstitious gesture, or perhaps one that had the power to stimulate the intellectual faculties. Whatever the case, it inevitably favoured the birth of a good idea.

  “My dear Matthew, that lunatic the Catalan has such a hold on the heart of the Pope that he has even been given a piece of the Vatican gardens for his exclusive use! He lives enclosed in a dwelling surrounded by a tall fence like some kind of impregnable fortress; it won’t be easy for you to talk to him. As far as I know, he receives no visitors. And people are scared of it. Everyone avoids him… Or at least, most of them do.”

  Duraguerra broke off, as a thought occurred to him. The more he thought about it, the more seductive and feasible the idea seemed to him, and when he spoke again, his expression seemed more optimistic.

  “There does perhaps exist someone who can act as an intermediary between you and that old madman, though.”

  “Then send him to me. Please!”

  “Wait a moment.”

  Duraguerra left the other cardinal and went over to the apostolic throne. He bowed, walked across the empty space that kept the crowd of bystanders at least three paces from the person of the Vicar of Christ, climbed the steps of the platform upon which sat the great sacred throne and then whispered for a few minutes into the ear of the pontiff. Boniface’s face darkened and he nodded.

  “Is our nephew Crescenzio here?” the pope asked aloud.

  A slow, curious murmur went around the room. After a few minutes, that tight curtain of robes belonging to every religious order in the Christian world parted to let through a boy of about twenty, with intelligent eyes that were as black as his hair, which glinted with copper-coloured reflections in the sunlight. He paused for a moment to greet Dante Alighieri, whom he had recognized among the others awaiting an audience, and then headed straight for the apostolic throne, dodging around the many monastic scholars in their showy cassocks.

  Crescenzio Caetani was distinguished by his own rather unique garment, of which the members of the curia enjoyed speaking ill. It was a tunic which came down almost to his ankles, made of good black cloth with lots of horn buttons down the front; he would almost have looked like a grave-digger if it hadn’t been paired with the beautiful and luxurious emerald green habit he wore beneath it, its sleeves and the lower hem presenting themselves discreetly to the view.

  In reality, he had chosen the black for a practical reason, which was to conceal the blood of the sick that he was stealthily visiting without leaving any visible traces upon himself. The garment’s hood ended in a point as was the fashion, but had an inner lining of oilcloth with two holes covered by glass lenses; if necessary, he could pull the lining out and lower it onto his face with a straw support on the front that held it rigid, thus obtaining one of those beaked masks that, packed with powerful antidotes, allowed one to walk unharmed even through sanatoriums infected by the plague. The whole ensemble had a certain elegance about it, but it certainly did not allow him to go unnoticed. As far as he was concerned, that eccentric costume was the uniform of his freedom, even though his uncle the pope deprecated it as a banner of passive rebellion.

  The pontiff’s face grew grim as he saw him approach.

  “Cardinal Matthew of Acquasparta has come to Rome,” the Pope whispered when his nephew was close enough to him that the others, though doing their utmost, could not hear their words. “Curious, isn’t it?”

  “Certainly, Your Holiness. It seems very strange to me. Right now when the academic year is beginning, the distinguished theologian has left his chair at the Sorbonne to travel. What will his students think?”

  “But what is stranger still is that he seems to be here in private. He has no formal office on the part of the King of France. Do you know what this means, Crescenzio?”

  “I can imagine. It means that Philip IV sends him here for something so pressing that he does not want to leave any trace in written documents of any kind.”

  The Pope’s eyes flickered with admiration. He was genuinely fond of his nephew, and although he deplored his disobedient attitude, he had used him on a couple of occasions to investigate very highly placed people who would never have tolerated knowing they were under inquiry. Crescenzio’s remarkable talents for logic had proved extremely useful, and now he was once again considering using them.

  “My son, relations between France and the Holy See are not as good as they once were. There is no open conflict, it is true, but the situation hangs on a razor’s edge. You are the perfect person for the task I am about to set you: skilled in discovering, and just as skilled at covering up again, when necessary. So make yourself available to the cardinal, listen carefully to what he has to say, and then report in full to me.”

  The boy seemed less than enthusiastic; politics was not among his interests.

  “Holy Father, clear up a doubt I have. Matthew of Acquasparta is a man who is deeply loyal to you. It would have been more logical for the king of France to give the job to another.”

  The Pope’s eyes grew as sharp as pins.

  “An excellent observation, dear nephew. Matthew is not simply a devoted collaborator for me: he is a friend. You will remember that
when the two infamous cardinals Pietro and Giacomo Colonna questioned my election to the throne of St. Peter’s basilica after the resignation of Celestine V, it was the cardinal of Acquasparta himself who came to my defence. His great authority as a theologian silenced all the wagging tongues, and this is why his arrival in Rome makes me wonder. I have many enemies in the Sacred College, all disgusting serpents in my bosom and all filthy spies of the king of France. Philip IV could have used that bastard Cardinal Jean Lemoine, for example!”

  “If he didn’t, Your Holiness, perhaps it is because he doesn’t want to upset you. He sends you Matthew of Acquasparta, a man who respects and loves you. Could it not be that he is holding out his right hand to you in the hope of making peace? “

  Boniface VII struck the youth’s arm with his fist in a clear sign of assent.

  “Well done, my boy! I thought the same thing, but in somewhat different terms: Philip IV is not holding out his right hand to me for peace – in reality he invokes me because he senses that he is slipping into an abyss from which he will not be able to re-emerge. He wants me to grab his outstretched hand to keep him from sinking into the morass of his own errors. I know, for example, that for years he has kept the brother of the Grand Master of the Templars locked away, and no one knows the reason for such cruelty. But a reason always exists: I am convinced that the king of France is plotting to attack my authority, and that Brother de Molay has proof of his guilt and so Philip IV decided to keep him in his grip, to blackmail him with his brother’s life. He is an arrogant and intolerable man, the king of France, a scoundrel who has his minions call him the Ensign of Christ, the eldest son of the Holy Mother Church… Well know whose son he is! But for now I’ll make the best of a bad situation. I will hold out to him the helping hand he requests: yours.”

  Crescenzio winced.

  “But Holy Father, I have no experience of diplomatic affairs.”